Castle 5-10: Significant Others

A divorce lawyer gets murdered the same week that Castle’s ex comes to town. Actually, I expected a bit more of a cross over between the two theme wise, but the show was still quite fun with a good mystery to boot. And I have to give my roommate credit for figuring out the big twist half way through.

The episode opens with our victim in a parked car. The back door of her car suddenly opens, she gets a horrified and shocked look on her face, and she is stabbed.

The victim was a high profile divorce lawyer who specialized in working for the rich. The rich wives that is. Obviously, all those former husbands make great suspects. There was a man seen leaving the scene of the crime, for example, but when they track him down, he says he was going to meet her yes, but because he used to work for her as a photographer. She wanted to hire him for one more big job. Likewise, the name and address she was holding in her hand turned out to be for a forensic accountant she wanted to hire to look into some transactions. Neither of these men knew what had her so agitated.

They go to the home, or ex-home, of the victim’s latest client. The client is spitting nails because she lost and she lost big. The victim showed up in court distracted. The victim had a woman’s blood on her jacket button, and this ex-client is the reason. After she lost, she attacked the victim, cutting her hand. They also meet this client’s ex-husband.

By digging into her past cases looking for former client’s ex-husbands who might have held a grudge, they determine that our victim was the lawyer for a divorce involving a high profile pro-golfer. Unfortunately, on a boating trip to try to reconcile, his wife vanished. That was 3 years ago, and he has never been charged because there was never enough evidence to convict him, although everyone treats him like he’s a killer.

They also make a connection between the pro-golfer and the victim’s new boyfriend. Turns out, he was undercover investigating our victim for the pro-golfer. Seems the pro was paranoid about being arrested for murder and wanted to see what the victim knew. But he has an alibi, so he’s not the killer. He does point them in the direction of the DEA where they learn something very interesting. Thanks to the satellite images the DEA has, they see that there was another boat near that of the pro-golfer the night that his wife died. And it belongs to…

The most recent client’s ex-husband. Somewhere along the way, seeing that information triggered something in the victim’s mind, and she started putting things together that he helped the pro-golfer hide the body after killing his wife.

Only the guy denies it. And with good reason. Yes, he was there to help someone on the boat, but he was helping the golfer’s wife fake her death and get away. She’s been alive this entire time. (Which is the twist my roommate figured out.)

And she is…the forensic accountant’s wife. When confronted, she finally confesses that she killed the victim to keep her secret. Originally, after faking her death she was going to leave the country, but before she did, she met her new husband and fell for him.

Meanwhile, we have a strong sub-plot going involving Castle’s first ex-wife. Beckett is actually staying at the loft while her apartment is fumigated. Alexis was supposed to go to Paris with her mom on vacation, but she comes down with mono. That’s when the ex-wife shows up to nurse her daughter back to health. Not knowing what to say, Castle says of course she can stay there.

Naturally, this doesn’t go over well with Beckett, and I can understand her point. And the ex-wife certainly seems to be going out of her way to drive a wedge between them, reminding Castle of their previous relationship. Castle tries to tell her to leave, but that doesn’t work out at all. He books a room at a hotel for he and Beckett instead, but she refuses to go. Meanwhile, Lanie is telling Beckett she needs to be the one to stand up to the ex while Esposito and Ryan are telling Castle what a disaster this is going to be and how things are going to blow up in his face.

Things change when the ex calls Beckett and invites her to dinner – just the two of them. Naturally, this worries Castle even more, and Esposito and Ryan egg him on. Turns out the two have fun and come back to the loft on friendly terms, even pulling a joke on Castle like they’ve shared some horrid secret about him.

By the end of the episode, Alexis has convinced her mom to go on vacation even if Alexis can’t go; she’ll be fine. Castle, the idiot that he is, almost insists the ex could stay, but fortunately, he tells her to have a great time instead. But a moment between the ex and Beckett obviously starts Beckett worrying. Beckett asks why they split, and the ex says it was because after several years of marriage, she realized that Castle has never shared anything personal with her. The final shot is of Castle going to make breakfast while Beckett has a worried look on her face. Obviously, that hit home. And if you think about it, we know so much about Beckett’s mom and her murder, but we never discuss Castle’s absent father.

Obviously, this is something we’ll come back to in later episodes. I’m wondering if this will help set up the February two parter. We did learn during last year’s two parter that his dad might have been part of the CIA (if we can believe a lying murderer). I wonder if they’ll follow up on that.

But for now, we had a great episode with some laughs and a few twists to the mystery. Until next week, let me know what you thought of the episode.